The Essence of Emma

[Newcomer]

Jane Austen's statement, “I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like.”, gives us an indication of the importance of Emma for the author. It is a clue that Edmund Wilson explores in the essay A Long Talk About Jane Austen. He lays out an audacious argument about Emma as well as possibly illuminating a character trait of the author herself. It seems timely to review these arguments in view of the currently released film Becoming Jane.
Wilson does not, explicitly warns against, a Freudian analysis. He gathers together family treads and weaves them into a cloth where certain patterns emerge. In this hypothesis Emma “is one of her novels in which the author's own peculiar 'conditioning' is most curiously and clearly seen.”. “Jane Austen spent all her life with persons related to her by blood – her parents, her five brothers, her single unmarried sister – and the experience behind relationships imagined by her in her novels is always an experience of relationship of blood, of which that between sisters is certainly the most deeply felt.”. The examples Elinor and Marianne in Sense and Sensibility, of Jane and Elizabeth in Pride and Prejudice and of Anne Elliot and the stand in role of sister and mother, of Lady Russel in Persuasion, are examined to develop the argument that this woman to woman sensibility is fundamental in the novels. There is a peculiar detachment in Austen, a coolness and leisure that allows writing for its own sake, that makes for a great artist. Only in Persuasion does Austen gives us a glimpse of a personal emotion, of a sadness at a woman's self-fulfillment missed.
Emma does not have sister, she substitutes Harriet Smith. “Emma, who was relatively indifferent to men, was inclined to infatuation with women;”. “Emma is not interested in men except in paternal relation.. Her actual father is a silly old woman: in their household it is Emma herself who, motherless as she is, assumes the function of head of the family; it is she who takes the place of the parent and Mr. Woodhouse who becomes a child. It is Knightly who checked and rebuked her, who has presided over her social development, and she accepts him as a substitute father; she finally marries him and brings him into her own household”.
“The comedy of the false sister-relationship of Emma has turned into something almost tragic.” Edmund Wilson echoes the comparison of Austen to Shakespeare in “Emma ... is with Jane Austen what Hamlet is with Shakespeare. It is the book of hers about which her readers are likely to disagree most; they tend either to praise it extravagantly or find it dull, formless, and puzzling. The reason for this is, I believe is that, just as in the case of Hamlet, there is something outside the picture which is never made explicit in the story but which has to be recognized by the reader before it is possible for him to appreciate the book.”. It is this quality of woman to woman sensibility, which is an insight into Jane Austen herself.

[Sir Bartholomew]

emma actually has an older sister. but anyway

"The reason for this is, I believe is that, just as in the case of Hamlet, there is something outside the picture which is never made explicit in the story but which has to be recognized by the reader before it is possible for him to appreciate the book.”

yep i agree. and this quality to be recognized can only be achieved through subsequent readings; it's where austen's irony really hits the spot.

[Newcomer]

it's where austen's irony really hits the spot.

Permit me a mild dissent. I think that Edmund Wilson has more in mind than just the recognition of irony. That would be equivalent to categorizing Bach's cantatas as just church music or Hamlet as just about revenge.
In the essay A Note on Jane Austen, C.S. Lewis writes, “Total irony' – irony about everything – frustrates itself and becomes insipid.” and “Unless there is something about which the author is never ironical, there can be no true irony in the work.” When Wilson writes “there is something outside the picture which is never made explicit” he is not being coy. That something lies between comedy and tragedy and within the bounds of “relationships of blood”, is where Austen operates.

[Literary_Cat]

As a longtime fan of Austen, I was astonished when I did some secondary reading to stumble across the quote that Emma was supposed to be hard to like. The first time I read the novel, I was charmed, rather than annoyed, by her selfish and at times almost willful ignorance. Subsequent visits, however, have made me understand what makes her so detestable--the overturning of the blood relationships which are so vital to Austen's novels.

Emma, a younger sister and motherless daughter, fancies herself a kind of older sister or mother figure towards Harriet Smith, and from that point the plot unravels. At last when Emma forgoes her improper authority over Harriet (and at last accepts the advice of the laudable Mrs. Weston), the conflict of the story is resolved.

[Sir Bartholomew]

to Newcomer:

Pardon then for being not half as smart as you. i just love reading those Austen novels; i can see that you must have a phd in literature or something and have been taking this thing too seriously that you even forgot to read the novels; and mind you i don't give a mild f**k about Bach or Hamlet at all, i'd rather listen to My Bloody Valentine and watch Irreversible. Anyway, why the heck am I bothering with this "too academic" thread of yours?

And so it goes.

[art_ish]

It is certainly insightful to see quite a few bits of quotes and I have also chanced upon Wilson's essay(though I never enjoy his harshness towards the book).. I guess everyone is permitted to different interpretations of the essay and I definitely agree to reading for the sheer fun and passion for it.
I have actually referred Wilson's comment to the social disorder in Highbury rather than the domestic relationships of Emma. It is true that Austen is a firm believer of functional family relationships just as she portrays Mrs. Bennet from Pride and Prejudice in a negative light. But I thought that woman to woman sensibility would have contributed to the greater picture of the social disorder in Emma as she forges friendship from different classes and matchmake marriages that transcends social boundaries. The final marriage of Emma and Mr. Knightley was fundamental to the restoration of social class as the book ends.